My hands worked in tantum, my thumb from my left rubbing slow circles as my right index finger stroked in and out. Almost immediately, her hips began to move to match my unhurried tempo.
She bit her bottom lip and threw her head back, trying to stifle her moan, but it made me hunger to hear her. Communication was key. I increased my speed and pressure, causing the muscles inside her to clamp down on my finger.
A victorious smile swept across my face. I hadn’t gone after her G-spot yet, and she was already halfway to ecstasy. She clawed at my arms like a mindless, needy thing, and the situation in my pants graduated from a nuisance to a full-blown irritation. I was hard and throbbing uncomfortably but pushed it aside. This wasn’t about me right now.
It was a slick glide as I sawed my finger into her cunt, and I reveled possessing her this way.
“I like how my finger looks inside you,” I said. “I imagine it’ll look even better with two.”
She bucked as I pushed my middle finger in alongside the first, and a groan of heat rolled out of her. The girl’s eyes were wild, frenzied with lust and need, and I thrust my fingers deeper, watching for a telltale signal. Would she cry out? Or would Sophia go utterly silent, her eyes rolling back in her head, as I located the spot that had eluded everyone else before me?
It didn’t take long. The cadence of her uneven breath shifted, and she jammed her hands into her silky hair. Her eyes slammed shut, but I allowed it when she whined the word, begging me.
“Macalister.”
My name in her broken voice was fire, raging a million times hotter than the one burning in my fireplace.
When I thrust my fingers faster, hammering the spot, her hands weren’t able to stay still any more than her body was. She slapped her palms against the cushion beneath her, her fingers splayed out, and she used her arms for leverage to help lift her hips, meeting my rapid pace.
I flicked my thumb back and forth, watching the barbell slide side to side as I manipulated her clit, using the rest of my hand to keep contact with her. It had grown challenging with how much she was writhing, but I was up to the task.
Air choked off in her lungs, and I saw the realization take hold in her eyes. I was going to win. Her body wanted that outcome. It was clamoring for it, and I’d done all within my power to make sure her mind couldn’t stop me.
“Wait,” she said with dread.
“Why?” I didn’t hesitate. “Because you don’t want to lose?”
“Yes,” she admitted. She couldn’t control herself when she was under my command, and she kept moving, encouraging me to do the same. Whimpers of pleasure seeped from her as she reluctantly neared the threshold. Her legs shook with such force, they looked powerless.
“Give it to me,” I demanded.
My dark order shoved her over the edge, and Sophia cried out as her orgasm gripped her. My orgasm, I corrected in my head. She contracted both inside and out, pulsing on my fingers as she collapsed onto the lounge, flinching and jerking with aftershocks. It made her perfect breasts undulate and her hands curl into tight fists. I took it all in, this viciously sexy scene that she’d never shown anyone else before.
It was our secret now.
I withdrew my hands from her and crawled over her body, settling my hips to hers and bringing our bare chests together. My cock was aching for satisfaction, but it would have to settle for my hand later. There was other satisfaction I needed.
I planted my lips on hers. To the victor went the spoils, and I took my fill while she continued recovering, one deep breath at a time, although I had the suspicion my kiss delayed it. I held her captive beneath my lips.
When our kiss finally ended, fear and wonder mixed together in her eyes. She was stunned I’d done as I said I would, and perhaps she was grateful, but her trepidation was growing over what had to happen next.
It was hard not to sound smug. “The name.”
Panic flooded through her expression, and then it shuttered. She slid out from under me, retreating. “There are two.”
I raised an eyebrow. “Are you asking for double-or-nothing?”
Because a second orgasm would be even easier to pull from her, but it’d take its toll on me. I was already thinking of ways to justify carrying her upstairs. Excuses that would permit me to discover how her piercing felt against my tongue.
“No,” she answered. “I’m only giving you one name.”
She tried to fold herself away from me, and I didn’t care for it. I scooped her up into my arms and pulled her into my lap, using the tip of my nose to draw a line up the side of her neck. Either the product she used in her hair or her perfume was the source of her apple scent.
“All right,” I said in a persuasive hush, right beside her ear. “Tell me.”
The orgasm had left her body, but the tremble remained. It wasn’t a shiver. The fire was warm, and I was holding her, which left me to believe this was stress. Was she worried once I had the name, I’d go after this person with surgical precision until I’d uncovered every last secret?
She wasn’t wrong.
Her eyes closed, unable to look at me. “The name,” she said, “is Sophia Alby.”
TWELVE
MACALISTER
MY EYES WERE BURNING WITH EXHAUSTION, and I kept my gaze directed out the conference room window to the sunlight while the men prattled on about the mortgage forecasts the lending team had presented. I had never fallen asleep during a meeting because doing so would be disastrous. My subordinates had lost enough respect for me; they didn’t need to lose any more.
I spent far too much time thinking about Sophia and didn’t realize the meeting had concluded until the room was nearly empty and a hand was on my shoulder.
“Dad?”
I looked up into the face that was so similar to his mother’s, sometimes I hated it. A constant reminder of what I’d had and was stolen from me. Royce’s eyes were mine, though, and concern lurked in them now.
“I’m fine,” I said in my usual gruff tone and stood from my seat.
My son didn’t believe me. His arms crossed over his chest, and he gave me a hard look. It wasn’t as severe as the one I had mastered, but it did its job well enough.
“It’s nothing,” I added as I grabbed my iPad off the table and brushed past him, heading for the exit. “I didn’t sleep well last night.”
It wasn’t technically true. Once I’d climbed into bed and the infernal cat stopped rubbing its face against my hand to encourage me to pet him, I’d quickly fallen asleep and slept soundly. But while I’d gotten quality, there hadn’t been nearly enough quantity.
As soon as Sophia had dropped her name, she’d leapt from my arms and pulled on her clothes, refusing to elaborate. It wasn’t part of the deal, she’d protested. I’d been bested by her again, more or less. She’d given me the one name I’d spent the evening trying to convince myself I wasn’t interested in.
Not fifteen minutes after she’d left, I’d pleasured myself in the shower, fantasizing all the ways I’d have her if I allowed it.
Royce followed me out into the hall, past the pictures of the different branches our family company had planted across the globe. “Take the afternoon,” he said. “Go get some rest.”